More than 100 complaints lodged over fixed Toyotas

Posted: Wed 9:39 PM, Mar 17, 2010

WASHINGTON (AP) - Complaints of sudden acceleration in Toyotasrepaired under recalls have nearly doubled in the past two weeks,according to an Associated Press analysis of government data. The complaints from 105 drivers raise questions about whetherToyota's repairs will prevent the cars from speeding up on theirown or if there is another reason for the problem. Toyota has said it is confident in its repairs and has found noevidence of other problems, such as faulty electronics. Theautomaker did not immediately comment Wednesday on the latestcomplaints. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said it wascontacting owners who have complained about their repairedvehicles. David Strickland, NHTSA's administrator, said in astatement Wednesday the agency has found "several instances inwhich a dealer made mistakes in applying one of the recallremedies." He said NHTSA has discussed the issue with Toyota, which istrying to improve instructions to dealers. Toyota has recalled more than 8 million vehicles worldwide sinceOctober over complaints that gas pedals can become sticky ortrapped under floor mats. An AP review of a NHTSA database found reports of repaired carscontinuing to accelerate on their own had jumped to 105 since March4, when the government reported 60 such complaints. The complaints are submitted online or through a NHTSA hot lineand have not been independently verified. In many of the comments, which can be filed anonymously, ownerssaid the sudden acceleration issue reappeared only days after theircars were fixed at their local dealership. "I went in for the recall and it seems there is a worse problemnow," wrote the owner of a 2008 Toyota Tundra in Boynton Beach,Fla., who reported unwanted acceleration in early March. "I trulybelieve this is an electronic problem." John Moscicki, of Lake Oswego, Ore., told the AP his 2007 Camryaccelerated on its own five times before he got the vehicle fixedunder the floor mat recall last month. On March 4, his repaired Camry took off from a standing stop onthe freeway and accelerated to 50 mph before Moscicki managed tostop it by shifting into neutral, hitting the brake with his leftfoot and pulling back the gas pedal with his right. "It just went to the floor like some other system had controlof it," said Moscicki, who raced high-performance sports cars andpreviously owned a Porsche restoration business. His Toyota dealer had the Camry for a week, and Toyota sent in afield engineer to examine the car without finding anything wrong.Moscicki said he had planned to give the vehicle to his college-agedaughter but now intends to get rid of it. "I wouldn't let heranywhere near this car," he said. The safety concerns are difficult to pinpoint because they couldbe related to any number of factors, said Diane Steed, who servedas NHTSA administrator during the Reagan administration. Besides telephone interviews with owners, the agency will lookat how dealers fixed the cars, whether the problems involved commonparts or the same manufacturing facilities or whether human errormight be involved, she said. Steed, who led the agency during a lengthy review of suddenacceleration complaints in Audi sedans, said there is no specificthreshold that would automatically lead the agency to demand thatToyota, or any other automaker involved in a recall, come up with anew fix. "It's really an engineering judgment call," she said. "Thereal challenge is not so much the numbers but digging to get to thebottom of what is the problem." --- Associated Press Auto Writers Dee-Ann Durbin and Tom Krisher inDetroit, Dan Strumpf in New York and AP writers Allen Chen in NewYork and Dibya Sarkar in Washington contributed to this report.

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